Scoping clarifications

In putting together all our decisions into the Introduction and Conformance
sections - I found that we don't have any wording for a few things that I
think we decided. Below are three things - that if we agree on - should be
clear in the last call document. 

 

 

1)       We intend for a page to be accessible without requiring that all
links on a page lead to accessible content.  (otherwise one could never link
to content out of their control). 

2)       We want to allow people to separate content on their website and
make claims for some but not all of it.  (someone else may require
accessibility but we do not).

3)       We also decided that a process shouldn't be accessible up to its
final stages and then go inaccessible.  Like everything in a store but the
checkout.  

 

 

To fix this - I am suggesting that we add the following  to our scoping
section  which currently reads 

 

 

 

<current text>


Scoping of conformance claims 


Conformance claims can be limited, or "scoped," to pertain to only some
parts of a Web site. All conformance claims, however, must be directed to a
URI or a range of URIs. Scoping to exclude a particular type of content (for
example, images or scripts) from a site is not allowed since it would allow
exclusion of individual success criteria. Scoping by URI to exclude sections
of a site is allowed so that authors can make claims for just some parts of
a site. Example 3 above is a scoped conformance claim. 

<end of current text>

<start proposed text to add to the end of the above>

 

Scoping can include and exclude parts of a site.  But if any Web unit that
is part of an authored unit or part of a process or does not meet WCAG 2.0
at some conformance level then no Web unit that is part of the authored unit
or part of the process can claim conformance at that level. 

 

Example 1:  An online store has a series of pages that are used to select
and purchase products.  All pages in the sequence must conform in order to
claim conformance for any page that is part of the  sequence.

 

Example 2:  A site has a collection of videos for which it was not required
to and did not want to claim accessibility.   The site can locate the videos
in one location (e.g. example.com/movies) and then write a conformance claim
for the site or section of the site that excludes that location.  As long as
the pages on the site only linked to the videos (and did not embed them in a
Web page or other web unit) the conformance claim would be valid.  Linking
to inaccessible content does not make a page inaccessible.  Only if that
content is rendered together with the web page (or other web unit) or if the
content is itself a Web unit within the set of URIs to which the conformance
claim applies (or if the Web unit is part of a process for which a claim is
made) would it have to meet the guidelines in order for the claim to be
valid.

 

This scoping provision does not preclude an organization, customer, or
government from requiring that all parts of a site be accessible or meet
some standard including WCAG.  WCAG does not require that full websites
conform, although that is certainly seen as desirable.   A conformance claim
only requires conformance for Web Units that are in the URI set described in
the claim.

 

<end proposed additional text>

 

 

 

 


Gregg

------------------------

Gregg C Vanderheiden Ph.D. 
Professor - Depts of Ind. Engr. & BioMed Engr.
Director - Trace R & D Center 
University of Wisconsin-Madison 
< <http://trace.wisc.edu/> http://trace.wisc.edu/> FAX 608/262-8848  
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